If staff are having trouble locating the terminal digit sections quickly, the supervisor could add more of which of the following?

• A. To encrypt electronic records
• B. To schedule retention periods
• C. To assist in locating records by terminal digits
• D. To manage patient final discharge summaries

Answer: (C)

Understanding terminal-digit filing helps explain why adding more of these sections would speed up locating records. In this system, records are organized by the last digits of a record or file number, creating groups or sections that guide where a file sits. When staff struggle to find a terminal-digit section, increasing the number of sections raises the granularity of the indexing. More subdivisions mean a given record is placed into a more specific group, so the search path is shorter and the exact location is found more quickly.

The other options don’t affect how records are located by terminal digits: encrypting electronic records improves security but not retrieval speed; scheduling retention periods determines how long records are kept, not how they’re found; managing discharge summaries relates to the content and workflow of those documents, not their physical or numeric location.